


to love like the world might end

by miriad



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), F/M, Getting Together, JFC Marvel Are you freaking KIDDING ME WITH THIS SHIT, M/M, Multi, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Peggy deserved better, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Spoilers, Steve Rogers getting everything thing he wants with the people he wants because he's a BAMF, Steve deserved better, Threesome - F/M/M, We all know Steve could never stay out of trouble EVER, World War Threesome, bucky deserved better, fixit fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2020-02-07 08:05:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18616561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miriad/pseuds/miriad
Summary: Steve isn’t sure that his plan is going to work, is the thing.[An Endgame Fixit story because I just can't believe that's how it would go. I just CAN'T.]





	to love like the world might end

**Author's Note:**

> I had... a rough emotional reaction to the end of Endgame, as I know many people did. I just could not believe that Steve Rogers could do what he did, and not act on the knowledge he had about Bucky and HYDRA. So, I chewed on it all day, and this popped out. Hopefully this scratches an itch for other people besides me.

He shows up at the house in the evening, when he knows she’s heating up some dinner, and knocks on the door. He’s got flowers in his hand, presentable in his clothing but nothing fancy. 

Steve waits, not patiently, because he’s far past that point, rocking back on his heels, but he focuses on his breathing to keep from looking any more manic than he already does.

She opens the door with a small smile on her face, that polite for strangers smile that doesn’t sit quite right, a little vacant. “Hello, what can I-“ She freezes when she sees him and the smile drops off. 

“Hi, Peggy. I know I’m a little late for our dance, but I figured late was better than never.” He starts to raise the flowers but stops when he realizes she’s pulled a gun and it’s pointed directly at his face.

*

Steve knows all the details of Peggy’s life because he’s read them all. 

After the ice, he’d asked for all the files his clearance could get him, and he’d poured over them again and again, despite his memory capturing them perfectly, forever, after the first run-through.

He read about her early days with what was now called SHIELD. He read about her adventures with Mr. Jarvis and Howard Stark, and with various other people, and how she became the Director of SHIELD.

He read about how she’d gotten married, how she’d had children, and grandchildren. How she’d been involved in the lives of her brother’s children, as well as Stark’s kid, when he’d let her, that is.

It had been like watching a movie, or reading a novel, a story he’d been fascinated by and wished he’d been a part of, but never could. He’d always be on the outside, looking in. Reading about his favorite characters and wishing he’d be able to join Huck and Tom just one time.

Thing is, that file had listed addresses. Dates, times. Phone numbers. Post office boxes. Which elementary schools her children had attended, which high schools they’d graduated from, colleges they’d gotten degrees at. Offices she’s worked at, buildings SHIELD had held secret offices in where Peggy’d had a desk. 

Steve knows them all. All the addresses. All the dates. All the windows of opportunity he has to make some kind of change. 

*  
Steve isn’t sure that his plan is going to work, is the thing. He knows he loves Peggy. He knows he wants to see her. He isn’t sure how far her feelings for him went, no matter what she’d said in her old age. Time, he knows, can make a person forget the bad things and add sepia overtones to the rest. 

He talks to Hank Pym before he finalizes his plans, asks him about his history, about where he did work with his Pym Particles, how long he’d been at Camp Lehigh, oh, isn’t it funny they’d both been there, chuckle chuckle. Pym is excited to speak with him, the same old Cap fan business he’s been getting since 2012, and he uses it to press for every advantage he can without seeming too pushy.

Once he’s gone through the time machine (there’s a name for it, Bruce would be on his case about it, but whatever, it’s a time machine and everyone knows it) drops back in on Camp Lehigh, in 1971 this time, and steals ten of the Pym Particle tubes. 

He needs room to work. He needs a back-up plan.

Ten should be enough, Steve is sure. He can always come back for more.

*

“Who are you?” Peggy snaps out, voice tight. 

“Peggy,” Steve starts, trying to stay calm. He knew this was a possibility. He knew she wouldn’t take him at face value right away. He just needs to keep from getting shot.

“Who. Are. You.” She says, even slower, the way people used to speak to him when they learned he was deaf in one ear.

“It’s me. It’s Steve. I know you don’t believe me, and it’s crazy that I’m here, but it is me.”

“Prove it,” she says, the gun never wavering, despite the slight shake to her voice. He takes a breath and swallows.

“Do you fondue?” He asks. She makes a small squeaking noise, and then the gun is gone, he can’t be sure where, and she’s reaching for him. He drops the flowers on the porch.

Peggy pulls him in to the house by his shirt front and slams the door shut, then he’s pressed against it and she’s pressed against him, and they don’t say anything else to each other for a long time.

*

Later, much later, tangled up together, the sheets a sweaty mess, he runs his fingers across her back and she rests her head on his chest and he just can’t get enough of being close to her.

“You need to tell me now,” she says, her cheek mashed into his pectoral, her voice slightly muffled. “I need to know what’s going on. I can’t help if I don’t know.”

“It’s completely insane,” he says, wrapping a single curl around his finger. “It’s hard to believe.”

“Steve,” she says, pinching his side lightly. “I was there when they transformed you into the good Captain. I think I can handle hard to believe.”

So he tells her. Everything.

*

He knows that if he goes back in time, he can’t just go. He knows too much. 

Despite everything Tony said about changing the past, Steve can’t just live in a world where HYDRA is in congress, or God forbid the White House. He can’t live in a world where wars are started by his own country but for the goals and benefit of his greatest enemy.

He can’t live in a world where he knows his best friend in the whole world, one of the two loves of his life, is being tortured and brainwashed and forced to kill people, for HYDRA, and not do anything.

He just can’t. 

*

Steve uses one of the Pym Particle tubes to travel to those golden days when Bucky was living in Wakanda, raising goats. He’d been on the run himself, working outside of Wakanda to try and mitigate what damage HYDRA had caused, and what problems the Avengers had created themselves by going in and trying to solve other people’s problems. 

He was not unaware they’d made mistakes. He was supposed to be their leader, at least on the battlefield, and he knew the score. He’d been trying to fix at least some of it. 

He didn’t get very far, he’d always felt, not when he had to hide from Tony Stark and the US Government at every turn. 

But he’d had a way to contact Bucky, once he was out of cryo, both the beads from Shuri and good, old fashioned burner phones, most commonly courtesy of 7-11. They’d use the burners when it was dangerous for Steve to have the beads on hand or when either of them was feeling particularly paranoid. 

The opportunity is there, so easy to take, to reach out to Bucky and get the info that he needs, and Bucky never even needs to know it isn’t HIS Steve he’s talking to. 

Steve picks up a burner at a corner store in Turkey. He’s got a whole getup going on, with a hat, glasses, neck scarf, a touristy backpack, the whole works. He sends a text to one of the numbers he knows Bucky has active on this particular date, and sends the proper code.

Bucky replies back in less than five minutes with the appropriate, and approving, code. The call is on.

Steve’s found a large city park, full of open spaces but some large trees, what kind he’s not sure, and he finds a table under a tree but away from anyone else in the park. He sits down and pulls out his notebook, dialing Bucky’s burner and lets it ring.

“Hey,” comes the voice across the line and Steve’s chest gets tight. He can’t get over hearing that voice. It just doesn’t get old. It probably never will.

“Hey,” he says, letting his smile pass over through his voice. “How’ve you been, Buck?”

“Oh, you know. Herding goats is a full-time gig, so busy. Named one after you.”

“I’ll bet you did,” Steve laughs, leaning back. He knows what he needs to ask but he can’t quite do it yet. It’s too good to talk to Bucky. Too good to hear him joke and be happy, even for just a minute. 

“You don’t call on a burner just to shoot the shit, pal. I don’t mind chatting but don’t hesitate on my account. What do you need?”

Steve sighs. Leave it to Sergeant Barnes to cut through the bullshit. He grits his teeth and reminds himself what he needs and why he needs it. “I have some leads. On some of those HYDRA higher-ups that slipped away. I’m doing some tracing back, but I have a bunch of gaps. I was thinking, maybe you could fill them.”

There’s a long pause. Steve can hear Bucky breathing, can hear the goats in the background, the sound of children laughing in the distance. 

He waits.

“What do you need to know?” Bucky finally says, his voice tight but steady. Steve’s so proud, so blown away by how strong Bucky is. It just makes Steve love him even more. If Bucky can be brave enough to open himself up, Steve can be brave enough to follow through and ask him.

*

“How do we find him?” Peggy asks, sipping her tea, her hair pulled back into a loose bun, curls framing her face. She’s just in her robe, but finally wearing something over that glorious body of hers, more’s the pity, and with each sip of tea she gets more and more serious.

“I’ve got intel from him, about what he remembers, plus the file I was given after we took down HYDRA. And SHIELD, I guess.”

Peggy looks away at that point, her face pale. Steve reaches across the table and places his hand over hers. She pulls it away.

“You couldn’t have known-“ He starts, trying to make her feel better somehow, but she slams her tea cup down on the table and stands up.

“It’s my job to know, Steven Rogers. You come here, claiming to be from the future, of all things, telling me HYDRA infiltrated my own organization, which I apparently eventually run and yet still never catch on, and you expect me to take comfort from some platitude about how I couldn’t have known?” She wraps her robe tighter around herself and paces over to the kitchen sink, standing under the only light that’s on in the entire room. It makes her look like she’s in a painting, right out of the Renaissance. He wants to paint her himself, just as she is. Beautiful.

“Based on the date, I think we still have some time before they start using the chair device on him. I think he’s still…” Steve wants to say frozen. He wants to say in cryo but he can’t. Those words are too soft. Too kind for what it was that had happened to Bucky. He swallows back bile but keeps going. “He said they couldn’t control him. That they froze him until they could. The records we have don’t start until 1954. He told me that sounded about right. At this point, he’s…”

“In a freezer somewhere, waiting for evil people to perfect their evil. Wonderful.” Peggy’s suddenly a whirlwind of motion, back to the table to get their tea cups and saucers, setting them in the sink, placing the plate of cookies back on the counter and brushing the crumbs from the table into her hand, then into the trash. 

Steve watches everything, soaking it all in, unable to look away from this woman he’s missed for so long. She stops in front of him, hands on her hips, her face set in that determined Peggy way.

“Well, come on,” She says to him, holding out her hand to pull him out of his chair. “We haven’t got all day. Bucky needs us.”

*

Peggy calls Howard, who tells them to drive on out, despite the early morning hour. 

They’re met at the front door by Mr. Jarvis, who herds them in, not unlike Bucky’s goats, and takes their jackets. Steve feels underdressed, having forgotten a bit about expectations in the 1940’s, but follows Peggy’s lead. 

He wonders if Mr. Jarvis is the namesake for Tony’s Jarvis and then just assumes that he is. It’s a very Tony thing to do, and unless he’s traveling around in time to find a living, breathing Tony, he doesn’t have anyone to ask. 

Steve’s never been to Howard’s house before, had only ever seen Howard at military installations and on missions, so this is quite the eye opener. He’s starting to see why Tony ended up the way he did, although even thinking that makes Steve feel guilty.

Mr. Jarvis leads them to Howard’s office, which looks more like Tony’s lab, where Howard is hammering on some kind of device. Steve hopes it’s not explosive or incendiary.

“Howard, look what lost ducking turned up on my doorstep this evening.” Peggy says, getting Howard’s attention. Howard looks up slowly, his mind still focused on his gadget, mouth opening to say something smart, Steve’s sure, when Howard finally really looks at Steve. 

“Holy fucking shit.” Howard drops the gadget. It does not blow up. 

*

Steve doesn’t want to be Steve, at least the Steve that’s also Captain America, not anymore. He’s done with that life, he just wants to live with Peggy, and hopefully with Bucky. Which is what he tells Howard, but in a way that keeps his secrets still his secrets. Howard can keep his own secrets but can’t always be trusted with other people’s. 

The problem is, he needs to pull this one last mission. The biggest mission of all. 

Saving Bucky.

“You’ll need a suit.” Howard tells him.

“Sure,” Steve says, willing to go this far with him.

“Let me work on something, something that’s not quite as… spangly as the last one.” Howard’s already designing in his head, Steve can tell, so he just smiles and clasps Howard on the shoulder.

“Great. I can’t wait.”

Peggy isn’t as onboard with the “no longer Steve plan”, if only because she’s practical.

“You look like yourself. That’s hard to hide. And what else would you call yourself? I mean, really.” She’s busy putting things together for the diplomatic trip she’s supposed to be taking, but is really a cover for the part of their plan to rescue Bucky.

“I don’t know. Fred?” She throws a shoe at his head, which he catches and tosses gently into her suitcase. She promptly removes it and repacks it correctly.

*

Howard comes through with a suit that, while not as high tech as what Tony built for him, offers the kinds of protections he really needs. Thicker fabrics working almost like an armor. Diffused colors to help him blend in, instead of standing out like a walking American flag. Pockets for various bits and bobs. A holster that holds two handguns, space for knives. 

It’s perfect. 

He’s decided that Nomad is a good name, if he must pick one for his persona. It fits him, now, who he is and what he’s doing. If he were to be captured while on this mission, that’s the name he’s going to give.

Peggy, who hasn’t lived in a world with superheroes and aliens yet, except for Steve himself, thinks it’s ridiculous. “I don’t see why you need a code name to tell to people,” she tells him. “Seems entirely against the point.”

“Well, I’m not going to tell them my name is Fred, am I?” He counters back. 

“Of course not. Fred is even more ridiculous than ‘Nomad’.”

She does run her hands over the suit more than a few times when he tries it on at Howard’s house. Her hands linger over his chest, on his ass. She grabs his crotch and caresses him, with a wicked grin on her face, which is how he knows exactly how much room Howard left him for his dick.

“Did you like the other suit this much? I can’t recall,” He says, a slight waiver to his voice.

“Oh, it was alright. Sergeant Barnes was always the bigger fan than I. But this one is growing on me.” She leans in and kisses him, then gooses him on the ass one more time.

Howard approves as well, making a few notes for what he’d add next time but that what Steve’s got on right now is just fine.

“Let’s go get your boy,” Howard says.

Steve doesn’t correct him. Mostly because he’s not wrong.

*

The warehouse is in a deserted section of Moscow, a part of the city that had been used for wartime manufacturing but now the war was over, hadn’t been converted into anything else. From the specs Howard and Peggy somehow got their hands on, it looks like the place made parts for submarines. 

Knowing what he knows about the future, he’s not sure why it’s not still operating. The Cold War required a lot of hardware and munitions, too, but he’s not going to question a deserted building in a dark section of the city. 

There’s one light on, over a door in the far back corner of the property, with a single guard sitting at a small desk. It’s cold, a light snow falling, and Steve thinks how much it must suck to have to sit outside for hours and guard this shithole. 

Then he remembers that it’s a shithole owned and operated by HYDRA, and he feels less bad.

The plan is this: he gets into the building. He confirms both number of guards and any other security features he can find. He tries to locate Bucky in the building, if he is indeed still there. Once he’s done so, he calls in Howard to take over, so no one turns off the freezer and inadvertently kills Bucky in the process.

The new suit is very dark and Steve moves through the shadows like he is one himself, undetected and silent. The guard at the desk isn’t very attentive, really, and Steve takes him out without any resistance. He rifles through the little desk, finding a bag of roasted nuts, a hand gun, a key on a lanyard, and a stick of gum.

He takes the gun and the key, and heads to the door. The key conveniently opens the door, which leads into a dark hallway. There isn’t another soul in the building. The dead idiot out front was the only guard.

There’s a series of light switches just inside but he leaves them off. He tries all the handles, finding a coat closet, a janitor’s closet, and finally a set of double doors that open into what had to have been a factory floor but has been cleared of all it’s equipment. 

Except for the row of tubes against the back wall, one of which emits a low blue glow. 

Steve runs across the room, not caring if anyone can hear him or see him, just needing to know if it’s Bucky.

He throws up when he realizes it is.

*

“This is some fucked up shit, Rogers,” Howard says after he takes his fifth or sixth long pull off the bottle of vodka he’d found in one of the labs.

“Yeah, Stark, I know,” Steve says, head in his hands. He’s still raw in places: his heart, his head, his stomach. Howard holds out the vodka but Steve waves it away.

“I’ll have to reverse engineer the machine to make sure-“

“I don’t care, Howard. Just get him out of there.” Steve counts each breath as he takes it in and as he pushes it out, slow and steady. He thinks about Peggy, who’s rounding up medical care for Bucky using their connections with the Howlies, trying not to use anything related to SHIELD. 

Nothing that could raise the alarm that Bucky’s been discovered. They can’t risk anyone trying to get him back. 

Howard drinks some more, then caps the bottle shut. He wipes his mouth off with the back of his hand, and stands up, only a little wobbly on his feet. “Let’s make this happen.”

*

It takes less than two hours and Howard’s got it figured out. They know they have until the next guard shift arrives, and the clock is ticking, so it’s a relief that the technology isn’t nearly as complicated as Steve had feared.

“I think it’s the actual freezing part that’s difficult,” Howard says, screwdriver clenched between his teeth. “The thawing out part, that’s simple.” He finagles a few more things, Steve couldn’t tell anyone what exactly, then the machines makes a grinding noise, a small whine, and seems to shift down into a lower gear.

The lights on the machine change and the glass window starts to fog up. After thirty minutes, Steve sees Bucky’s mouth move, sees his head shift. It’s so strange to see him like this, because his hair is still relatively short, his face hasn’t gone as gaunt and hard as the Bucky he’d last seen. But it’s still Bucky, and that’s enough.

*

He wakes up for a brief minute, panics when he sees Steve, and Howard ends up sticking him with a needle full of sedatives. 

“He thinks you’re dead, Cap,” Howard says, looking up at Steve. “Which isn’t exactly a weird thing to think, at this point. So, I’m not worried about his mental capabilities just yet. But let’s get him back on US soil and see how things go. That’ll be the real trick.”

Howard’s not a doctor but he knows enough, and they wrap a very naked James Barnes up in the wool blanket Steve found in the coat closet to transport him back to Howard’s plane. Steve carries him bridal style, pressing Bucky tight against his chest. 

Bucky’s left arm is missing, which he was expecting but Howard apparently wasn’t, despite the whole arm thing being part of Steve’s mission briefing to both Peggy and Howard, but it doesn’t really matter. It makes Bucky a bit off balance but nothing Steve can’t account for easily, and Howard doesn’t seem worried. 

They make it out of the building with minutes to spare, the car carrying the new guard pulling in only a few minutes after they exit the building. Howard’s watching through binoculars as they head into the alleys surrounding the factory, walking to get back to the truck Howard parked on one of the empty runways, used when one of the factories used to produce bombers during the war. 

Steve climbs in back with Bucky, covering him with more blankets and a series of chemical warming packs Howard had thrown together before they left. Howard’s already driving them to wherever Peggy’s planning to meet them, so they can drive back to the plane and get the hell out of there.

Steve looks down at Bucky and brushes a stray lock of hair off his forehead, having to pull it away from the clammy, wet skin.

“I got you, Buck. You’re gonna be just fine, pal. Just fine.”

*

Howard pays for a private nurse and a doctor who worked for the studio system for years and is used to treating famous people and saying nothing to no one about it. 

He looks over Bucky’s arm, checks the stump for infection and damage, and declares that Bucky is going to be fine. 

Peggy and Steve are relieved. Bucky probably would be, too, if he were awake.

“He’s gone through an incredible amount of physical trauma. I’m sure it hasn’t been easy on his mind, either,” the doctor says, frowning down at Bucky, eyes going back to his left arm over and over. “The body sometimes takes itself to a place where it can heal and do nothing else. We see this in coma patients all the time- their bodies need to heal and can’t afford to expend the energy needed to be conscious. Give him time. He’ll wake up. Eventually.”

All they can do is wait, and stand guard, to make sure no one comes to try to collect Bucky, to take him back. Steve doesn’t sleep, just sits up in Howard’s living room, with what he learns is Bucky’s rifle Peggy held on to, along with a few other things belonging to Steve and Bucky, waiting for someone to try something. 

Anything.

“No one knows we have him, Steve. We just have to wait on Bucky. There’s nothing else we can do,” Peggy tells him, kissing him on the lips, deep and true, hand in his hair. “Come to bed at some point, will you?” She asks him. Steve isn’t sure he can do that just yet. He can’t believe there isn’t anything he can do.

Howard, of course, takes the whole situation as a challenge to build Bucky an arm that will work, once he’s awake and functional. Steve’s told Howard about Bucky’s original HYDRA arm from the future, and Stark is fascinated. Steve wonders if Howard wasn’t actually the original designer of the arm, and just didn’t know what it was being used for or by whom.

He doesn’t want to go down that path, so he focuses on the rifle in his hands and refuses to think about it.

*

Bucky eventually wakes up. And it doesn’t go well.

Then he wakes up again. And again. And again.

Howard hires people to help, to work with him. Steve is there. Peggy, too. They all do what they can, what they know. It doesn’t help and doesn’t help and then, one day, it does. It’s a complicated thing, the brain, which Steve already knew from his previous experience with Bucky and honestly, with himself.

Eventually, Bucky begins to believe that Steve is really his Steve. Alive and well, despite all reports to the contrary.

The day it truly sinks in, Bucky curls up in his bed, in one of Howard’s guest rooms, and weeps, a keening wail coming from his mouth, his right hand covering his face.

Steve climbs into the bed with him, trying desperately to wrap his arms around Bucky, trying to offer some form of comfort, any at all. Bucky just seems to cry even harder. It’s like he can’t even get a breath in and Steve’s panic level just keeps rising. 

The noise brings Peggy to the bedroom door, and when she sees them laying there, hears Bucky’s sorrow and relief, she steps out of her shoes and climbs into bed with them. Pressing against Bucky’s back, she kisses his neck and wraps her arms around him, finding Steve’s hands, tangling their fingers together.

“We’re all here,” She says, her lips moving against the skin where Bucky’s shoulder and nape meet. “We’re all here together and we’re all alive. We’re all just fine.” She squeezes Steve’s hand as she says it and Bucky wheezes between them. 

Eventually they all fall asleep together, just like that.

*

Eventually, Howard’s doctor says Bucky can go home, wherever that is. Howard offers to let them stay with him, but Steve and Peggy aren’t huge fans of the idea. Bucky hasn’t said much of anything, but at the look he shoots Steve, Steve knows he feels the same. 

They head back to Peggy’s little house, with her garden that needs tending after being away so long and what’s sure to be a kitchen full of rotten food, only to find that Howard has already been by and thought of everything.

The lawn’s been mowed, the garden weeded and the leaves raked, and the kitchen’s been cleaned and restocked.

“I’d be livid if I weren’t so damn tired,” Peggy says as she toes off her shoes inside the door. “Well, gentlemen,” she continues, “Let’s take this party upstairs, shall we?”

Bucky looks at Steve, one eyebrow raised. He’s had his hair trimmed, back to the cut Steve remembers from the war, and it throws him off every time he sees Bucky’s face. Bucky’s left shirt sleeve is pinned closed, just below where his arm ends at what would be mid-bicep, Howard’s prosthetic not quite ready to try out yet. He looks so young and so desperately tired, Steve just wants to take him to bed and never get back out.

“After you,” Steve says, bowing slightly and motioning with his arm. Peggy starts up the stairs first. Bucky flicks Steve’s ear with his finger but doesn’t say anything and starts up after her. 

Steve takes a minute to make sure the lights are all off and grabs the bag Bucky brought from Howard’s to take upstairs. He can hear the other two talking as he climbs up.

“Where’s the guest room?” Steve hears Bucky ask.

“Oh, darling,” Peggy says to him. “You aren’t sleeping in the guest room.”

“Peggy, I don’t-“ Bucky starts and then abruptly stops talking. Steve’s eyes widen and he hurries up the last few steps to see what’s going on. He’s thinking about where all the weapons are, what can be used as weapons, and so on, when he hits the upper landing.

Peggy and Bucky are both frozen just inside the bedroom door, looking in at something. He pushes through them, careful of Bucky, not wanting to jostle him too much, and then he sees why they stopped. 

Peggy’s room had at one point contained a beautiful suite of furniture and a full-sized bed. It had been a tight fit for she and Steve, but they’d made it work. After that first time sleeping in bed together at Howard’s, the three of them, Steve wondered how they’d pull it off back at Peggy’s house, with her set-up. He’d had thought about all sorts of ideas that involved mattresses on the floor or just sleeping on top of each other, which had a certain sexy appeal once Bucky was back in that headspace. If he ever were.

But apparently Howard had realized what was happening between the three of them, and took care of the issue, replacing Peggy’s full-sized bed with a king sized one instead.

“Well, that’s a relief,” Steve finally says, setting Bucky’s bag on the floor at the end of the bed, all of Peggy’s furniture gone, as there clearly isn’t room for the items with a bed that size in the space. “I was worried we wouldn’t have room to spread out.” 

He starts unbuttoning his shirt and undoing his pants, tired in a way that suddenly makes his hair hurt. As he’s lifting his undershirt over his head, a hand presses against his stomach. Large and warm. Clearly Bucky’s. Steve finishes removing the shirt, then presses his hand over Buck’s.

Bucky leans in to him, resting his chin on Steve’s shoulder, his mouth next to Steve’s ear. “Thank you.”

“For what?” Steve breathes out, not sure he wants to hear the answer.

“For finding me.” Bucky kisses his cheek and steps away, pulling off his own clothes.

Steve has to take a moment to pull himself together. His chest is tight and his teeth hurt.

When he can finish undressing, he finds Peggy and Bucky are already naked save for a few thin undergarments and are working together to pull down the blanket and sheets. 

“Are you coming, Steve, or are you going to stand there and catch flies all evening?” Peggy’s grinning at him, but her eyes show her nerves, and Bucky looks back at him, his face far more open and unsure. Steve grins at the both of them and drops his trousers to the floor, leaving him in just his boxers. He gently nudges Bucky, to get him up on the bed, and lays down next to him.

Peggy curls up against Bucky on his other side, exactly as they did before, this time for much more pleasant reasons. She reaches behind her and snaps off the lamp. She and Steve pull the blankets up and over all three of them.

In the dark, Bucky runs a hand down Steve’s flank, calluses catching on Steve’s leg hair. “I don’t know how we’re going to make this work. With everything.” Bucky says, his voice soft but steady. “But I want to. Make it work.”

“I, as well,” Peggy says. Steve hears her lips brush Bucky’s bare skin and feels goosebumps run along his own.

“Me, too,” he says to them, bringing Bucky’s right hand up to his mouth, kissing his fingers. “This is my dream, I can’t even pretend it’s not.”

“Then we’ll find a way,” Peggy says, her hand reaching across Bucky’s body to rest on Steve’s side.

“We need to take care of…” Steve can’t say it. He can’t say that evil name in this new bed they’ve made together, in the space they’ve just defined as good and theirs. But Bucky seems to know what he means, clear by the way he tenses against Steve’s body, and Peggy’s hand grips his side with more than necessary force.

“We will,” Peggy says. “Tomorrow. Tonight, we start with us. With this. And go from there.”

“Okay,” says Steve, and he leans forward and kisses Bucky’s lips, gentle and sweet, the first kiss in this bed of what he hopes is many, but he’s getting a feel for the current state of things.

When Bucky kisses back, a bit firmer, mouth open, a little bit of tongue, Steve knows that state is just fine. He feels Peggy’s hand run up Bucky’s chest, feels her rubbing and petting but gently, can hear her mouth on Bucky’s skin when Steve pulls his lips away from Bucky’s. 

They’re all breathing hard, all in it together. Just as it should be. 

Just as it will be, from now on.


End file.
